Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!convex!eugene!swarren
From: swarren@eugene.uucp (Steve Warren)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: ATTACK OF KILLER MICROS (Actually parallel systems)
Message-ID: <2146@convex.UUCP>
Date: 17 Oct 89 14:57:44 GMT
References: <35825@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV> <20336@princeton.Princeton.EDU>
Sender: usenet@convex.UUCP
Reply-To: swarren@eugene.UUCP (Steve Warren)
Organization: Convex Computer Corporation, Richardson, Tx.
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In article <20336@princeton.Princeton.EDU> mg@notecnirp.edu (Michael Golan) writes:
>Last year, I took a graduate level course in parallel computing here at
>Princeton. I would like to make the following comments, which are my *own*:
>
>1) There is no parallel machine currently the works faster than non-parallel
>machines for the same price. The "fastest" machines are also non-parallel - 
>these are vector processors.
>
The Cray XMP with one processor costs approx. $2.5M.  The 4 processor Convex
C240S costs $1.5M.  On typical scientific applications the performance of the
240S is about 140% of the single processor Cray XMP.  (The 240S is the newest
model with enhanced performance CPUs).

Also, vector processors are technically nonparallel, but the implementation
involves parallel function units that are piped up so that at any one instant
in time there are multiple operations occurring.  Vectors are a way of doing
parallel processing on a single stream of data.

These were the only points I would disagree with.

--Steve
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